A shop owner has been fined £8,000 for illegally selling pornographic DVDs without an age classification.

A SHOP owner has been fined £8,000 for illegally selling pornographic DVDs without an age classification.

Manubhai Patel, owner of Jami Newsagents in Coldharbour Lane, Hayes, was also given an eight month suspended sentence, 150 hours of community service and required to pay £5,000 in legal costs for possessing 540 unclassified porn films.

Mr Patel had already received a warning in October 2005 after the items were found in his shop following an investigation by Hillingdon Council's Trading Standard's department.

He later moved the DVDs to his storage facility in London Road, Isleworth, which again came to the council's attention.

Mr Patel, 50, who has been running his newsagent's for 20 years, said: "What happened is that someone sold me the wrong order and I wanted to send them back but meanwhile the DVDs were stored on my premises.

"They were old stock in my shop but I didn't sell anything like that, but the council said you can't keep it.

"The suppliers are based in Germany and I have tried to get back in touch with them but whenever I call no one answers.

"It is unfair because I can't prove that I wanted to send them back."

Mr Patel said he has to pay the fine in the next six months.

Kathy Sparks, deputy director of environment and consumer protection at Hillingdon Council, said: "It is illegal to sell DVDs which have not been classified. Their explicit content is likely to offend most people and would probably be rejected by the British Board of Film Classification who regulate this.

"We will continue to vigorously enforce legislation which controls this type of activity."

Presiding at Isleworth Crown Court, Judge Jonathan Lowan said: "It was entirely apparent that the defendant was running a commercial enterprise, part of which was packaging and supply of such unclassified material.

"The offences are so serious that neither a community sentence or fine was deemed appropriate alone, therefore a sentence of imprisonment was appropriate."